Exploring the resistance: an Australian perspective on educating for sustainability in early childhood (original) (raw)

A Critical Analysis of Concepts Associated with Sustainability in Early Childhood Curriculum Frameworks Across Five National Contexts

International Journal of Early Childhood

Curriculum frameworks have an important role in providing guidance to early childhood practitioners on how to integrate knowledge about sustainability into their practice. This article examines how ideas about sustainability are integrated in the early childhood curricula for Australia, England, Norway, Sweden and the USA. The analyses were guided by critical inquiry and a cross-national dialogue and focused on four aspects of the curricula: sustainability presence, views of the child, human-environment relationship and philosophical/theoretical underpinnings on ideas expressed about sustainability. Ideas about sustainability were more implicitly present than explicitly stated in most curricula.

Revealing the research ‘hole’ of early childhood education for sustainability: a preliminary survey of the literature

Environmental Education Research, 2009

In 2007, Environmental Education Research dedicated a special issue to childhood and environmental education. This paper makes a case for ‘early childhood’ to also be in the discussions. Here, I am referring to early childhood as the before‐school years, focusing on educational settings such as childcare centres and kindergartens. This sector is one of the research ‘holes’ that Reid and Scott ask the environmental education community to have the ‘courage to discuss’. This paper draws on a survey of Australian and international research journals in environmental education and early childhood education seeking studies at their intersection. Few were found. Some studies explored young children’s relationships with nature (education in the environment). A smaller number discussed young children’s understandings of environmental topics (education about the environment). Hardly any centred on young children as agents of change (education for the environment). At a time when there is a growing literature showing that early investments in human capital offer substantial returns to individuals and communities and have a far‐reaching effect – and when early childhood educators are beginning to engage with sustainability – it is vital that our field responds. This paper calls for urgent action – especially for research – to address the gap.

Editors' Review of 'Research in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability: International Perspectives and Provocations'

Mounting concerns about climate change and unsustainable development, and their current and future impacts on all of us – but particularly on children - provided the impetus for this book. Then, as researchers in early childhood education (ECE) and/or education for sustainability (EfS), we used these concerns to shape and question our thinking. This first-ever research text in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability (ECEfS) was advanced when the chapter authors, almost all of whom participated in one or both Transnational Dialogues in Research in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability (Stavanger, Norway, 2010, and Brisbane, Australia, 2011) met for the first time - a critical mass of researchers from vastly different parts of the globe - Norway, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand at the inaugural meeting, with participants from Korea, Japan and Singapore attending the second. We came together to debate, discuss and share ideas about research and theory in the emerging field of ECEfS. An agreed-upon outcome of the Dialogues was this text.

Educating for sustainability in the early years: creating cultural change in a child care setting

Australian Journal of Environmental Education, 2005

The early childhood education field has been slow to take up the challenge of sustainability. However, Brisbane’s Campus Kindergarten is one early education centre that is making serious efforts in this regard. In 1997, Campus Kindergarten initiated its Sustainable Planet Project involving a variety of curriculum and pedagogical activities that have led to enhanced play spaces, reduced waste, lowered water consumption and improved biodiversity. Such changes are not curriculum ‘add-ons’, however. A study of curriculum decision-making processes shows that a culture of sustainability permeates the centre. This has been by a process of slowly evolving changes that have led to a reculturation of many social and environmental practices. This study also shows that very young children, in the presence of passionate and committed teachers, are quite capable of engaging in education for sustainability and in ‘making a difference’.

Research in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability

Routledge eBooks, 2014

Mounting concerns about climate change and unsustainable development, and their current and future impacts on all of us-but particularly on children-provided the impetus for this book. Then, as researchers in early childhood education (ECE) and/or education for sustainability (EfS), we used these concerns to shape and question our thinking. This first-ever research text in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability (ECEfS) was advanced when the chapter authors, almost all of whom participated in one or both Transnational Dialogues in Research in Early Childhood Education for Sustainability (Stavanger, Norway, 2010, and Brisbane, Australia, 2011) met for the first time-a critical mass of researchers from vastly different parts of the globe-Norway, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand at the inaugural meeting, with participants from Korea, Japan and Singapore attending the second. We came together to debate, discuss and share ideas about research and theory in the emerging field of ECEfS. An agreed-upon outcome of the Dialogues was this text.

Sustainability education in early childhood: An updated review of research in the field

Sustainability education is increasingly practiced in early childhood, but a previous review of the literature suggests that there is little empirical research to provide the necessary foundation and critique. The current paper addresses the question of whether there has been an increase in empirical research in the field since this review, and if so, what are the theoretical and methodological developments informing this research. The method of the study is to review the literature in the field following similar processes to the previous review in order to provide a comparison. The articles identified were then categorized and evaluated according to their different theoretical and methodological orientations. The review found that there are twice as many articles as identified in the previous study and that these articles are now equally published in mainstream and environmental education journals. A meta- analysis of the articles using a typology of methodological orientations provided a basis for critique. Three major categories of theoretical orientation were identified as: Connection to nature; Children’s rights; and Post-human frameworks with varying degrees of theoretical engagement. It is recommended that new post-human frameworks recently applied in early childhood education research could usefully be connected to researching early childhood education for planetary sustainability.

Creating ‘deep and broad’ change through research and systems approaches in early childhood education for sustainability (2010) in J. Davis (Ed) Young Children and the Environment: Early Education for Sustainability. Cambridge University Press, pp. 273-291.

Young Children and the Environment: Creating Sustainable Change through Early Education, 2010

In this final chapter, Jo-Anne Ferreira and Julie Davis raise two matters they consider essential for the future development of early childhood education for sustainability. The first is the necessity to create deep foundations based in research. At a time of rising practitioner interest, research in early childhood education for sustainability is meagre. A robust research community is crucial to support quality in curriculum and pedagogy and to promote learning and innovation in thinking and practice. The second “essential” for the expansion and uptake of education for sustainability is systemic change. All levels within the early childhood education system – individual teachers and classrooms, whole centres and schools, professional associations and networks, accreditation and employing authorities and teacher educators – must work together to create and reinforce the cultural and educational changes required for sustainability. This chapter provides explanations and processes for engendering systemic change. It illustrates a systems approach with reference to a recent study focused on embedding EfS in to teacher education. This study emphasised the apparent contradiction that the answer to large-scale reform lies with small-scale reforms that builds capacity and make connections.

Sageidat, B.& Davis, J. (2014) Children's understanding of sustainability in their home and kindergarten. Journal of the Comenius Association, 23, pp. 9-10.

This article presents an ongoing study within early childhood education for sustainability at the Department for Early Childhood Education in Stavanger, in collaboration with the School of Early Childhood, Queensland University of Technology, in Brisbane, Australia. The study commenced in 2014, and will compare the responses to interviews of young children (4-5 years) in Brisbane with those of children in Stavanger, in order to find out ways to enhance learning about sustainability topics, to identify which kind of environmental/sustainability activities are memorable for young children, and to obtain mutual inspiration about early childhood education for sustainability from the different countries.